City police spokesman Sr. Comr. Rikwanto said on Friday that two men and one woman had been arrested for running an online prostitution business, along with five sex workers, in a hotel in South Jakarta.

“The woman is the pimp, while the other two are the website operator and the field coordinator. The workers are between 21 to 24 years old, mostly come from West Java and worked solely as prostitutes of their own free will,” he said.

They were arrested in two suites at the hotel, allegedly after transactions.

Rikwanto said the arrests were made after the police found three websites advertising the business and displaying the pictures of their workers.

The websites are www.krucil.net, www.bintangmawar.net and www.semprot.net, all of which offered online bookings to spend an hour at the hotel with one of the prostitute for Rp 600,000.

“The business generated Rp 50 million to Rp 75 million gross weekly income. The workers received half of each transaction,” Rikwanto explained.

“The hard part of uncovering prostitution nowadays is that many of them have started to use advanced technology and the Internet. Many of them, to cover up their illicit business, conduct their transactions in luxurious hotels, which put the privacy of their customers above all else,” Rikwanto said. (aml/lfr)